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ITEM CA3

CABINET – 21 JUNE 2006

Minutes of the Meeting commencing at 2.00 pm and finishing at 4.00 pm

Present:

The Cabinet considered the matters, reports and recommendations contained or referred to in the agenda for the meeting, together with a schedule of addenda tabled at the meeting, and decided as set out below. Except insofar as otherwise specified, the reasons for the decisions are contained in the agenda, reports and schedule, copies of which are attached to the signed Minutes.

105/06. APOLOGIES FOR ABSENCE

Apologies for absence were received from Councillors Keith R Mitchell and Ray Jelf.

106/06. DECLARATIONS OF INTEREST

Item 10: Home to School and College Transport

Councillor Michael Waine declared a personal interest on the grounds that he was a member of the Roman Catholic faith community in Bicester.

107/06. MINUTES

The Minutes of the meeting held on 6 June 2006 were approved and signed.

108/06. PETITIONS AND PUBLIC ADDRESS

The following requests to address the meeting had been agreed:-

Request from	Agenda Item
Mr Brian Hodgson (former member of the Oxford Deaf & Hard of Hearing Centre Management Committee)	9. Adult Learning Service
Mr Chris Bevan (on behalf of the Catholic Archdiocese of Birmingham)	10. Home to School and College Transport

107/06. REVENUE AND CAPITAL OUTTURN

(Agenda Item 5)

The Cabinet considered a report (CA5) which presented the provisional outturn for revenue and capital for the 2005/06 financial year.

Councillor Armitage, speaking as Shadow Cabinet Member, queried whether (in relation to the SAP for Schools earmarked reserve) schools would be paying individually for the general cost of implementing SAP in their premises, commenting that there could be a significant effect on schools if they had to finance both set-up costs and licence fees. He suggested that schools might benefit from purchasing low usage licences, at low cost, so that Heads of Department could access SAP on an occasional basis.

The Director for Resources confirmed that the County Council had set aside money for SAP for schools in the 2004/05 budget, which was estimated as sufficient to cover the cost of rolling out SAP to all of the County’s secondary schools, where the greatest use was likely to be made of the system. However, provided a school had a reliable financial system it was the school’s choice whether to move to SAP. He added that officers were currently investigating the possibility of obtaining low usage licences.

RESOLVED: to:

1. note the provisional revenue and capital outturn set out in the report;
2. approve the Directorate carry-forwards as set out in Annex 2(a) to the report, including the virement of carried forward underspends to other budget heads in 2006/07 as set out in Annex 2(b);
3. approve the use of the uncommitted health and safety underspend on planned repair and maintenance and accommodation work;
4. approve the use of balances to meet the overspend of £0.111m on non-domestic rates;
5. agree that the £0.041m legal fees arising from the Trap Grounds case be met from balances;
6. agree that the surplus in the On-Street Parking Account at the end of the 2005/06 financial year, so far as not applied to particular eligible purposes in accordance with Section 55(4) of the Road Traffic Regulation Act 1984, be carried forward in the account to the 2006/07 financial year;
7. approve the capitalisation of structural maintenance expenditure and application of the resultant resources as set out in paragraph 67 of the report.
   
   

108/06. FINANCIAL MONITORING

(Agenda Item 6)

The Cabinet considered the first financial monitoring report for the 2006/07 financial year, which covered the period up to the end of April 2006 for both revenue and capital (CA6).

Councillor Armitage, speaking as Shadow Cabinet Member, asked the Cabinet to ensure that the Premature Retirement Compensation budget was reviewed urgently. He expressed concern that schools were unable to confirm to teachers whether they could take early retirement, which was causing undue stress on teaching staff and meant that it was very difficult for schools to budget.

Councillor Waine stated that since the current criteria for the granting of early retirements were only just coming into operation, it would be premature to undertake a review of the scheme at this stage.

RESOLVED: to:

1. note the report;
2. approve a supplementary estimate of £0.094m to offset part of the carried-forward overspend on the former Children & Families service;
3. approve a supplementary estimate of £0.188m to offset the overspend carried-forward on Adult Learning;
4. agree the proposal to release £0.750m of the Pensions Reserve funding to be allocated equally between the planned major carriageway and footway reconstruction scheme in Oxford High Street and the pressures relating to certain corporate ICT Projects, as specified in the Council’s 14 February resolution of approval in respect of the Budget and Capital Programme;
5. subject to the Council’s agreement to the allocation of a £1m contingency as described in the report, approve the provision of £0.221m from the Capital Programme to fund part of the costs of a central data centre for the Council;
6. approve project appraisal ED650 and accordingly agree the allocation of £1m available capital resources to provide short term borrowing support for improvements to school kitchens as set out in the appraisal, subject to contractual arrangements with any participating school to the satisfaction of the Director for Children, Young People & Families and County Solicitor in consultation with the Cabinet Member for Schools Improvement;
7. approve the payment of £0.005m to the Chipping Norton Town Partnership to fund the setting up of a website.
   
   

109/06. STATEMENT ON INTERNAL CONTROL

(Agenda Item 7)

The Cabinet considered a report on the Statement on Internal Control (CA7) together with the draft Statement.

Councillor Patrick, speaking as Leader of the Opposition, expressed the hope that the Scrutiny Co-ordinating Group would continue to monitor the areas for improvement which had been highlighted in the independent evaluation of the Scrutiny function and that the internal audit remedial measures recommended by KPMG to address identified weaknesses were now working effectively, including the control improvements relating to project management.

Councillor Shouler commended the internal control processes as robust, but highlighted the need for a cautious approach to the control of and accounting for the growing number of pooled budgets for the future.

RESOLVED: to endorse the process of internal control undertaken during 2005/06 as evidenced by the Statement on Internal Control 2005/06.

110/06. ESTABLISHMENT MONITORING

(Agenda Item 8)

The Cabinet considered a report (CA8) which gave an update on activity since the implementation of the Establishment Review and associated recruitment approval process on 1 August 2005. Mr Kearey undertook to circulate to all members of the Cabinet a fuller analysis of the reported changes in Social Care for Adults and Business Support & Performance Management employees.

RESOLVED: to:

1. note the report;
2. confirm that the Establishment Review continued to meet the Cabinet’s requirements in reporting and managing staffing numbers.
   
   

111/06. ADULT LEARNING SERVICE

(Agenda Item 9)

The Cabinet considered a report (CA9) which outlined the financial challenge faced by the Service as a result of reduced funding from the Learning and Skills Council (LSC), and set out proposals to meet the challenge and put the Service on a sound financial footing.

Mr Hodgson stated that he understood that consideration was being given to an increase in the fees for lip reading classes from £16.50 to £20 a term, a 21% increase, in addition to the increases which had taken place over the past two years. He drew the Cabinet’s attention to the situation in Northamptonshire where a lack of enrolments following an increase in fees for lip reading to £57 a term had led to the cancellation of all classes. He urged the Cabinet to consider retaining the fees at £16.50 per term and to join the campaign to press the Government and the Learning & Skills Council to fund lip reading, British Sign Language and any other "social inclusion" courses.

Councillor Patrick, speaking in place of the Shadow Cabinet Member for Adult Learning & Cultural Services, stated that the shift in focus by the Learning & Skills Council towards vocational training was causing difficulties in the community and for those who used the Service for health and leisure. Tutors had been resigning due to the pressure of marking assignments, as a result of the move towards assessing what used to be ‘learning for pleasure’ classes. She urged the Cabinet to make representations to the government to reverse the shift in focus.

Councillor Seale stated that the increase in fees for lip reading classes to £20 a term was only indicative at this stage and that the charge might in the event be either higher or lower. He was however anxious to ensure that the fees would remain at a reasonable level. He further commented that since lip reading classes used to be funded jointly between Health and Local Government, the County Council should investigate who should now bear the responsibility.

In relation to Councillor Patrick’s comments, Councillor Seale reported that the Leader of the Council had already written to ministers to emphasise concerns about the philosophy of only funding qualification-based learning but had received a non-committal response. He pointed out however that classes which related to healthy living and classes to teach English to non-English speakers were still being funded by the Learning & Skills Council.

He added that the County Council was not a net funder of the adult learning service and therefore reductions in service would not result in financial savings to the County Council. However, reductions in service would result in reductions in future funding from the Learning & Skills Council which would lead to dissatisfaction within the community.

RESOLVED: to

1. approve the approach outlined in the report to ensure the future financial viability and organisational fitness of the Adult Learning Service;
2. noting the budgetary implications outlined in Annex 1 of the report, approve a temporary supplementary estimate of £174,000 to avoid the Adult Learning Service overspending in 2006/07, to be repaid in full by the Service in 2008/09.
   
   

112/06. HOME TO SCHOOL AND COLLEGE TRANSPORT

(Agenda Item 10)

The Cabinet considered a report (CA10) which reassessed the options for change against the outcome of the consultation on options for this area of service, which had provoked a generally negative response from parents to the possible options, although the response from schools had been generally more evenly balanced.

Mr Bevan urged the Cabinet to continue the County Council’s existing practice of maintaining funded travel to faith schools, commenting that whilst he understood the current financial situation, it would be unwise to revoke this policy while the Education and Inspections Bill was before Parliament, as this could lead to an extension of the funded transport that the County Council had to provide. He added that, in his view, ending free and subsidised travel to faith schools would be discriminatory and could result in the County Council facing legal challenge.

Councillor Turner, speaking as Shadow Cabinet Member, concurred with the Scrutiny Committee’s support for the recommendations not to proceed with proposal (2) (because of the potential effect on Chiltern Edge School and the capacity problems for other schools should it cease to be viable), proposal (3) (because of the additional expense for parents) and proposal (4). On proposal 1, he felt that a reasonable and fair compromise would be the adoption of proposal 1(b), which would maintain transport provision for faith schools at a concessionary rate in line with concessionary travel offered for students at out-of-catchment non-faith schools.

Councillor Mallon, speaking as local member for Blessed George Napier School, also urged the Cabinet to retain the existing arrangements. He urged the Cabinet not to end subsidised travel for those children from the Bicester area who attended the School as this would have a particularly detrimental affect for families on low incomes and would place additional pressures on Bicester schools. He considered that reducing or ending subsidy for transport to faith schools would be contrary to the purpose for which those schools existed, would reduce parental choice and would produce only modest savings.

RESOLVED:

1. to defer consideration of Proposal 1 (transport to faith schools) for review in the context of the budget for 2007/08 and future years;
2. not to pursue Proposal 2, which would end free transport to Chiltern Edge School for those not resident in Oxfordshire;
3. not to pursue Proposal 3, which would introduce of transport charges for post-16 SEN students;
4. not to pursue Proposal 4, which proposed the use of free school meals/working tax credit as grounds to waive the concessionary charge in place of existing criteria.
   
   

113/06. DOMESTIC WATER USE AND SUPPLY SCRUTINY REVIEW

(Agenda Item 11)

The Cabinet had before it an executive summary of the Domestic Water Use and Supply Scrutiny Review (CA11) which had aimed at the outset to assess current and future water need, demand, supply and usage.

Councillor Lamont, as a Member of the Lead Member Review Group, commended the report to the Cabinet. He expressed particular concern that, although Thames Water had indicated their willingness to negotiate a planning agreement in respect of the prospective reservoir development, this might be undermined by the financial structure of the water industry and the intervention of the Office of Water Services.

Councillor Belson welcomed the review recommendations, which are attached at Appendix 1, as being timely and expressed his thanks to the review team and the supporting Scrutiny Review Officer, Mr Hehir. In relation to recommendation 3(a) he advised that the Council already had a robust policy on the use of water in Council buildings, which had been endorsed by Thames Water.

Councillor Lamont welcomed a suggestion that the Lead Member Review Group should review the implications for water use and supply of the report by consultants Roger Tym & Partners submitted for consideration at the South East Plan EiP, which if adopted, would increase housing allocations in the Plan by 50%.

RESOLVED: to adopt the recommendations of the Scrutiny Review.

(Annex 1 to the Minutes)


114/06. VILLAGE HALL/COMMUNITY CENTRE GRANTS 2006-2007

(Agenda Item 12)

The Cabinet considered a report (CA12) which summarised the applications received for the improvement of village halls and other community buildings, and recommended allocations from the grant fund for 2006/07.

Mr Munro reported Oxfordshire Rural Community Council’s appreciation of the County Council’s continuation of this scheme, and their appreciation of Councillor Seale’s interest and assistance.

Councillor Seale thanked Oxfordshire Rural Community Council for their commendable work. He reported that he would be writing to all those councillors whose villages would be receiving grant aid for their local schemes.

RESOLVED: to approve the grants proposed in Annex 2 to the report.

115/06. EDUCATION PROJECT APPRAISAL: FARINGDON COMMUNITY COLLEGE

(Agenda Item 13)

The Cabinet had before it an Education Project Appraisal for Faringdon Community College (CA13).

RESOLVED: to approve detailed project approval ED609/1.

116/06. FORWARD PLAN AND FUTURE BUSINESS

in the Chair

Date of signing 2006

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